In which issues concerning the profession of philosophy are bitched griped about

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Vol. 193 Web "Only" Ads

The vol. 193 web "only" ads are being updated from the bottom. I don't like it. Put the newest ads at the top.

I do kind of like how you can click an ad and see it all by its lonesome. Although I'm not 100% sure what practical utility this function might have. But I thought I'd try to mention a positive instead of complaining all the time.

33 comments:

The mobile version of the site doesn't scroll (it doesn't have a scroll bar and everything below the frame is inaccessible), so seeing one at a time is key in that mode. Newest first would be better, at least as a viewing option.

Frankly I thought it would have been more useful if the link just took you down the page to the ad's location on the full list. But this is far from being one of the top issues/problems with the JFP. So I'm letting it slide.

Based on my experience on two search committees (an admittedly small sample), I don't think it's unusual to wait a month to hear from the department that interviewed you. They may have had more candidates to bring to campus after your visit, and, depending on schedules, those may have taken several weeks. They also may need to run background checks and/or consult references before making a decision. They may have had a hard time getting their faculty together to discuss the on-campus visits. They may, frankly, have decided that you are hireable but only their third choice, and they're waiting to hear back from the top two candidates before extending you an offer or informing you that you're out of the running.

8:58/11:28: Check the wiki (http://phylo.info/jobs/wiki). If the wiki indicates that they've scheduled on-campus interviews, then you can reasonably conclude that you weren't in the first group of on-campus interviewees. If the wiki does not indicate that they've scheduled on-campus interviews, then maybe there is still hope. In my own experience, after a first-round interview, the interviewers will usually not contact me at all unless they want to invite me for an on-campus visit. So, if you weren't selected for an on-campus interview, you might just never hear anything from them again.

Speaking of the JFP on the APA site, they seem to have hidden it again. Instead of following the intuitive procedure of clicking on 'resources' and then 'member resources' (or was it the other way around?), now you have to click on 'members only' and then 'publications'. Even if you are logged on as a member, it is not listed under the 'publications' link from the main page.

This APA website is just absurd. I'm too tired to make fun of it anymore. It just sucks period. I'm starting to wonder if it is part of some kind of malicious government psychology experiment to track how long reasonably smart people will follow something that is completely stupid before they give up. Oh, I guess the job market might be a malicious government experiment as well.

"This paper is competent, and while it wouldn't be horrible to publish in [top-20 journal], I don't recommend publishing it. The author gives reasons to prefer one version of [thesis X] over another, given the framework of [view Y], but the reasons aren't that strong or exciting. Normally I have helpful comments for the author, but not in the case, because the paper is simply competent but lackluster."

Next time, I strongly recommend the editor just give me a "reject without comments". Jesus.

My favorite journal rejections are those in which it's obvious that the reviewer never bothered to read your paper at all.

Recently I submitted a paper to the top journal in my AOS. I wasn't expecting it to be accepted, but the reviewer comments were maddening.

He complained that I never cited the most recent paper on the subject, even though I did—repeatedly.

He complained that I falsely asserted X, even though I stridently argued not-X.

He complained that I misinterpreted a quote from philosopher Y by failing to understand the context of his remark in terms of the larger argument of book Z, even though (as evident from the citation) the quote was not from Z, but from an entirely different book.

He complained that another quote inaccurately translated a particular Latin word, even though the original was in French not Latin, and the translation was not my own but the scholarly standard required by the journal itself.

It went on and on like that.

I used to bitch about the hand-waving impossible to defend against reasons typically offered for rejecting a paper. But to have a paper rejected for very specific reasons that are complete and total horseshit is vastly more annoying.

maybe i'm missing something, but is the APA site all but completely broken now? none of the nav bar links work. i can't really leave the home page. as far as i can tell, there's no way of finding the job ads.

Instead of clicking on 'Members Only Expand Members Only' (that's literally what it says right now) in the blue toolbar at the top, you should click on 'Members Only' at the very top right hand corner of the page (above the search box). It's easier that way. Once you click on that 'Members Only' link you will have the option to choose 'Publications.' That's where the JFP is.

8:10, that's the feature (bug) that's browser-specific for me. When I use Safari I get that strange line of nonsense-looking headers (real words but don't seem to mean anything), but in Firefox it looks normal, presumably as intended.

Yeah I complained and even hoped that my paper would be reviewed again as the editor was also the author of the paper the reviewer falsely accused my of ignoring...so I figured he might be embarrassed by the cock-up.

But alas, he responded that the my paper was rejected in the "initial review" process which was necessarily cursory and thus it was unbecoming of me to expect an exacting analysis, etc.

How that rebuts my complaints was rather unclear; but instead of continuing to press the point, I just dropped it and resolved to never submit a paper to that journal again.

I think they need to hire someone to run the job website who has been through all this recently and so knows how frustrating all this is. Preferably someone who doesn't already have a full time academic appointment. It probably wouldn't be a full time job, but it might supplement crappy adjunct pay.